I have had just one difficulty early on with my Lightspeed Plasma II, and it was 100% my own fault. My coils, which are mounted to my engine case, didn't have enough strain relief on the wires that run to the "brain" box. One wire managed to break -- partially, causing the coil to run intermittent. It checked out fine on the ground but in flight it wasn't firing reliably. Again, MY OWN FAULT because I didn't wire it properly. The unit itself ran flawlessly once this was worked out.Yukon said:In the interest of safety, would you be willing to share your difficulties with all brands of electronic ignition?
rv6ejguy said:Hall Effect triggers are far more reliable than magnetic pickups in my experience.
I have owned 3 different Rotax engines, and have over 650 hours flying a 912. The carbs & ignition ran flawlessly. I have never heard of a problem with the carbs. They need to be synchronized, but that is an easy annual maintenance item.rv6ejguy said:The Rotax techs say they see almost no ignition problems on these engines, ever. Problems with carbs much more often.
While some of the other systems are quirky (like the oiling system) they all work if proper procedures are followed. It has been an interesting experience, something between the auto and aero engine world.
Captain Avgas said:On the contrary, the magnetic crank sensor is more reliable....less complexity. In fact the only people I know at a personal level who have had trouble with Lightspeed Ignitions have all had them with the hall effect sensor. One had his unit just drop dead. The other had oil seeping into it from the crankcase.
I spoke to a major experimental engine manufacturer recently and they confirmed what I suspected. The magnetic pick-ups are more reliable.
Geico266 said:I have owned 3 different Rotax engines, and have over 650 hours flying a 912. The carbs & ingnition ran flawlesly. I have never heard of a problem with the carbs. They need to be syncronized, but that is an easy anual maintenence item.
There are more Rotax engines flying that any other engine in the world.
FWIW, I have 1200 hours on a Slick 4371. No problems whatsoever (other than...ugh...it's a mag). I do 500-hour inspections on it, and I changed the points at the 2nd inspection for warm fuzzies. Maybe I've been lucky. Or maybe Slicks aren't as bad as you implied.Martin Sutter said:Installed a new Lycoming from Van's with 2 Slick mags on my RV6 in 2000. The first Slick failed at 280hrs, the second one at 340. When I sent one in for repair I commented to the service tech that it had only 280 hrs since new - his reply was you are lucky, we get them in here with less than 100hrs. So much for Slick magneto reliability!
The previous engine in that airplane had Bendix mags. They ran 1400hrs with no problem, changed points and condensor about half way just to be safe.
Martin Sutter
building and flying RV's since 1988
akarmy said:I have one slick and one Jeff Rose electroair ignition. This setup has run great for 550 hours. The only problems I have had with the electroair is the plug wire terminations. They used to use a combination of a rubber gasket and brass nut that would eventually fail and not hold the wire tightly in the plug.
This situation has since been fixed by the new owners of electroair and a new set of plug wires I got from them work perfectly now. They have a very similar end to what the slick harness setup uses.
zav6a said:990 hours with one failure. There is small clearance between the hall effect sensor and the crank mounted wheel. Apparently a grain of sand miraculously found it's way into the cowl, back up into this area, and finally between the wheel and pickup. The mechanical damage was evident. There are dual pickups so the second unit continued to run fine. Although it worked OK when realigned, I replaced the pickup anyway.
It was not a total failure. Partial misfire was evident on that unit on runup. Like a partial magneto failure, it was not very evident in the air when operating on both units.
Marc,MCA said:Have one P-Mag and one slick mag on my engine. I'm now (Sunday) in a hotel in Wells, Nevada (nice little food stop along the freeway) and waiting to call Brad at e-mag tomorrow.
Anyway, hoping Brad will be able to get a part out by Tues to continue the trip.
erich weaver said:Walter - Im skeptical that there is any difference at all between timing that has been set using the blow method and timing set using the physical method. Can you explain why you think this is the case? Any confirmation on this from the folks at e-mag air? If there really is a difference this is important information to know.
thanks
erich weaver
Let me just state up front that I've been very happy with Brad at Emagair.erich weaver said:Walter, anything you can share with us on this, or is this more of just a hunch on your part? Im really not out to
flame anyone, just trying to get out any information thats available and make sure I know whats going on as much as possible.
Marc,MCA said:... LED when in run mode. Normally, the LED turns off. In my case, the LED was yellow, which Brad said meant the shaft and the sensor were misaligned somehow.
dan said:I'm curious how and why this failure mode occurs?